International Focus – New York, facing the challenge of housing and feeding asylum seekers who have arrived in large numbers

By RFI correspondent in New York

The Roosevelt Hotel still retains vestiges of the charm and luxury of its past: huge crystal chandeliers, velvet carpets and curtains. But in its crowded lobby, anxiety and uncertainty reign: immigrants from Latin America and Africa, some from Afghanistan, rest as best they can. Junior Montiel is Venezuelan. Although a newcomer, lonely, broke and unemployed, he considers himself lucky to not have slept outdoors.

“I slept inside, that is, I slept not with the utmost comfort, but sat on the floor. But I am a refugee, they say, and they give us the opportunity to have something, a roof to live on.

New York is the only city in the country where accommodation and food are guaranteed by law. But because of the current crisis, for immigrants such as the young, the young and the single, the “right to shelter” today only means a chair or a floor. It gets a little better for families with kids who can afford a room. Carla, her husband, and their two boys, ages 5 and 8, have been at the Roosevelt for three months.

“It operates like a hotel, it has its benefits and they serve you breakfast, lunch and dinner, all of that, they change your sheets,” he explains. “Housing is very important because you come with your children and we don’t have a place to live. We don’t have anyone to take us in, nothing like that, thank God they give us this support, but what we are looking for is a stable job, something stable,” he adds.

Natalia is 24 years old and arrived in New York 10 days ago. His kids are worried inside the hotel and go outside to get some air.

Natalia is Venezuelan from Falcon State, and makes it clear that she is alone at the moment. “I have a partner but it’s also difficult for us because we haven’t found a job and how can you look for work with the kids? Right now, when he doesn’t come out, I go out, so one day, I’ll see if we can make it work but for now we don’t,” she says. He says.

The hotel is already full and immigrants keep coming. In addition, the New York government paid a rent of $220 million to the Pakistani company that owned the hotel to use it as a hostel for the next three years. For activist Ariadne Phillips, hotels are not the answer.

“We know that maybe these were the first affordable options, but all these places like hotels or even tents are not fair or enough to really live there. To tackle this crisis as it really is, a housing crisis, we have to think about long-term solutions. We cannot Thinking about temporary things in the short term. For us, that’s a waste of money,” he affirms.

In just over a year, more than 100,000 migrants have already arrived and the crisis continues to deepen.